Who’s Minnesota’s favorite superhero?

According to a press release I just received, today is National Superhero Day. “Who’s your fave?” it asked. I’ve two things to say about that:

1. Grow up.

2. Obviously, Batman.

These might be controversial points. What do you mean, grow up? Comic book heroes have been legitimate adult pastimes for decades! They’re a bright, wide swath of American culture!

Yes, and that’s the problem. Trust me: If you answered the “favorite” question by adjusting your fedora and saying “Charlton-era Steve Ditko’s ‘The Question.’ You probably haven’t heard of him,” you should stop reading and go away. What follows will not make you happy.

We have had enough of superheroes, I think. Do you know why “Jaws” was popular? Because every other movie in the theaters wasn’t about sharks. Imagine if you went to the multiplex, and everything was from the Shark Cinematic Universe. Sharks in space, sharks having civilized affairs in an English country manor, courtroom dramas where two sharks square off in a divorce suit, a World War II movie about an intrepid team of sharks who land at Normandy and bite Nazis in half.

This is how most people feel about superhero movies these days. The world is always in peril. Some dark force must be vanquished by people who float in the air and look stern while computer-generated effects stream out of their hands. Nothing is real; nothing matters — but hey, the post-credit sequence teases the next movie, which is about the Coming of the Scralls from the Multiverse Dimension of Direness, so you’ll be pumped for the next iteration of the product.

Anyway. Batman happens to be Minnesota’s favorite, according to a survey conducted for some reason by casino.org. He is the best, because he doesn’t have any powers. He has skills and tools, but he does not save the city by stretching out his arms and using whatever variant of The Force the scriptwriter has invented.

He also is vulnerable. If you throw Captain America at a wall at a speed of 50 mph, for example, he will shake it off and spring right back, because he drank a super-serum 80 years ago. Kick Batman hard enough and he has to go home and have his butler tape up his ribs and give him Advil.

The Christopher Nolan “Batman” movies were the best, and not just because Batman talks like he just speed-smoked a carton of Luckies. They’re reasonably plausible. But that was DC, and I was a Marvel guy. Growing up, Spider-Man was my favorite, because he had Teen Angst and girl trouble. Key word: teen.

In our 20s, we’d talk about the comics we loved, but most had moved on. The idea that comic books would not only be grown-up entertainment but come to define the culture would be like telling us that one day we’d hear “My Sharona” over the grocery store sound system. Oh, man, the grown-ups would never let that happen.

Mind you, I enjoyed the movies for many years. Same with “Star Wars.” But at some point you feel as if you’re having cheesecake for every meal. You need something better. Something that makes you think and tells relatable human stories. Something with hope and a connection to our cultural traditions.